Customer Counting Systems

The area I live in has several annual events coming up that are good for businesses and would make it beneficial for store owners to invest in customer counting systems. I say this because while I was working at my part-time retail job I thought about the coming month and two of those activities that will be taking place. Having lived here for over 30 years I am very familiar with the events and I also know that many vendors are in attendance and will need supplies. Some purchase cash boxes, some raffle tickets and others will purchase cash registers. Since I have worked for this retailer for over seven years now I know many of the requests we will get so I started to look at our in-stocks on several of the items. Sure enough we were out of many or critically low and there is a good chance we will lose sales without getting more into the store. We were still several weeks away from the start of the season so I let my store manager know of the potential for missed sales opportunities if we did not put in a request for replenishment of these items. The store manager said he would look into it. The company I work for does have a door counting sensor and the data is tracked and used to some extent I just do not know how much. For small and medium sized retailers if you aren’t keeping track of the foot traffic in your store you could be missing your own opportunities to increase sales.

Customer counting systems are exactly what they sound like. They are systems used to keep up with the number of people entering a store. While many stores will track only the number of sales transactions that take place through the point of sale systems, the system reports how many people entered the building. Some may be protesting, “Why should I care about how many people came in, I need to know how many people spent money!” You should care because if there is a difference between transactions and foot traffic you should be asking, “Why didn’t these people spend money in my store?” How many missed opportunities were there to get an additional sale and your team dropped the ball? During special events or activities was there an increase in patronage that did not reflect in your sales? Was there anything you could have done to increase sales during those times or improve add-on sales? These are all questions that would not need to be asked if a store manager has a door counting sensor installed.

The addition of a door counting sensor would be beneficial to the small store owner for evaluating the impact local events are having on your business. Using the information gleaned from that data can help prepare you for similar events in the future. If the activity is going to be an annual event then you can look at what you sold and ran out of and have more on hand next time. As an example take the Fourth of July. If you sell coolers, grills, grilling accessories or outdoor games look at what your foot traffic was last year and sales of those items. Did you run out? Add a few more units to your on-hands the next year. Did your door counts far exceed your sales transactions? You can use this information in conjunction with your scheduling plans to determine if you could have used additional floor help to provide service. Could you have used an extra cashier to ring transactions so people would not get frustrated and leave empty handed? Bill Bregar, the founder of Loss Prevention Systems Inc. recognizes that not having real patron numbers only gives you a glimpse at what is really taking place in your store. This is why he strongly supports adding a system to his client’s stores.

Customer counting systems are a valuable tool for retailers who are truly interested in improving sales. Used in conjunction with sales data and calendar and event activities it can be a powerful addition for evaluating what you are doing and preparing for future activities. Don’t settle for less than your store can actually produce, install a door counting sensor today!

Get more information on customer counting systems, contact us or call 1.866.914.2567 today

A Door Counting Sensor Is A More Sensible Method To Allocate Payroll Than Old Sales Data

I work in a college library as a day shift supervisor. I have recently changed shifts from being an overnight supervisor in the same library for the past six years. The difference in positions is significant. Where I am used to working with only a few students in the building after 1:00am, I now have to adjust to having several hundred in the building at any given time. This means we provide more assistance, have more student workers during a shift and usually will have more staff at one time. We also have more resources on campus to refer a patron to when they have questions regarding their enrollment, classes, fines, etc. There are times when retail owners and managers have varying numbers of customers in their buildings too. Knowing when those differences take place and being able to track them by day of the week, hour of the day or a particular seasonal event enables store managers to adjust workloads around those times and utilize payroll dollars in a manner that makes sense. The question is, how do you track customer counts? Using customer counting systems is the most efficient means of doing this.

Customer counting systems keep track of the number of people entering a store by the hour of day. In our library we send a worker around with an iPad and they count the number of people we have on an hourly basis. A door counting sensor can alleviate this problem and for a store, a waste of payroll if someone is stationed at a door to count heads. They can provide electronic article surveillance (EAS) alarm response time for store managers to assess whether personnel are responding to alarms appropriately. The advantage of having the EAS system is that a store can impact theft and fraud and improve profits through reduced shrink. Add that to the benefits of adjusting payroll to be customer driven and stores can see substantial profit increases.

I know some of you may doubt me right now. It sounds a little incredible that something as simple as a door counting sensor could really make an impact on sales. Consider for a moment that there are people coming into your store and leaving without making any purchases. If you knew how many people are visiting and at what time they are visiting you could adjust your scheduling. I am aware of two methods that are regularly used for retail scheduling by large businesses. One method is when a store is allocated payroll hours by a headquarters and stores use the hours where they deem appropriate. It may be based on merchandise shipments that will be coming in that week or a store manager allotting hours based on prior year sales data.

The other means I have seen used is to have payroll dollars allocated to a store. The headache with this is there has to be tracking of employee pay rates. A store may have to have fewer people on the salesfloor for a shift since Mary Ann earns $10.00 an hour while Jimmy Bob earns $8.00 an hour. When these stores are trending over that dollar amount they have to cut payroll dollars. This poses a conundrum for the store management team they have to decide where those hours will come from. Do you take it from cashiering? Then you have a line of customers that gets angry and abandons shopping carts and leave the store. Oh and don’t forget the snowball effect that has. Now, someone has to get all the merchandise put back and that is on top of the regular tasks that have to be done before the store closes. Is the team going to have to stay later than scheduled in order to get the store back in shape for the next day? A customer counting system allows managers to see when the peak traffic is in the store. Payroll based on dollars or hours using old sales information may give a false picture of the needs for the store.

Get a true picture of how many people are coming into your store. Use a door counting sensor and get reliable information without wasting payroll dollars to do it. When you staff your store to provide adequate service to all of the people walking through your doors you will see your sales improve and that translates to more returning customers and new customers due to word of mouth advertising.

Need information on a door counting sensor? Give us a call at 1.866.914.2567 now.

I work in a college library as a day shift supervisor. I have recently changed shifts from being an overnight supervisor in the same library for the past six years. The difference in positions is significant. Where I am used to working with only a few students in the building after 1:00am, I now have to adjust to having several hundred in the building at any given time. This means we provide more assistance, have more student workers during a shift and usually will have more staff at one time. We also have more resources on campus to refer a patron to when they have questions regarding their enrollment, classes, fines, etc. There are times when retail owners and managers have varying numbers of customers in their buildings too. Knowing when those differences take place and being able to track them by day of the week, hour of the day or a particular seasonal event enables store managers to adjust workloads around those times and utilize payroll dollars in a manner that makes sense. The question is, how do you track customer counts? Using customer counting systems is the most efficient means of doing this.

Customer counting systems keep track of the number of people entering a store by the hour of day. In our library we send a worker around with an iPad and they count the number of people we have on an hourly basis. A door counting sensor can alleviate this problem and for a store, a waste of payroll if someone is stationed at a door to count heads. They can provide electronic article surveillance (EAS) alarm response time for store managers to assess whether personnel are responding to alarms appropriately. The advantage of having the EAS system is that a store can impact theft and fraud and improve profits through reduced shrink. Add that to the benefits of adjusting payroll to be customer driven and stores can see substantial profit increases.

I know some of you may doubt me right now. It sounds a little incredible that something as simple as a door counting sensor could really make an impact on sales. Consider for a moment that there are people coming into your store and leaving without making any purchases. If you knew how many people are visiting and at what time they are visiting you could adjust your scheduling. I am aware of two methods that are regularly used for retail scheduling by large businesses. One method is when a store is allocated payroll hours by a headquarters and stores use the hours where they deem appropriate. It may be based on merchandise shipments that will be coming in that week or a store manager allotting hours based on prior year sales data.

The other means I have seen used is to have payroll dollars allocated to a store. The headache with this is there has to be tracking of employee pay rates. A store may have to have fewer people on the salesfloor for a shift since Mary Ann earns $10.00 an hour while Jimmy Bob earns $8.00 an hour. When these stores are trending over that dollar amount they have to cut payroll dollars. This poses a conundrum for the store management team they have to decide where those hours will come from. Do you take it from cashiering? Then you have a line of customers that gets angry and abandons shopping carts and leave the store. Oh and don’t forget the snowball effect that has. Now, someone has to get all the merchandise put back and that is on top of the regular tasks that have to be done before the store closes. Is the team going to have to stay later than scheduled in order to get the store back in shape for the next day? A customer counting system allows managers to see when the peak traffic is in the store. Payroll based on dollars or hours using old sales information may give a false picture of the needs for the store.

Get a true picture of how many people are coming into your store. Use a door counting sensor and get reliable information without wasting payroll dollars to do it. When you staff your store to provide adequate service to all of the people walking through your doors you will see your sales improve and that translates to more returning customers and new customers due to word of mouth advertising.

Do You Sense That You Have More Customers Than Sales Reflect? A Door Counting Sensor Can Help You Identify Missed Sales Opportunities

I remember when I first moved to my state the road system was horrible in some areas. There was a military base to support and the area was a tourist destination as well. Two major road arteries coming into and out of the area were inadequate for the amount of traffic we were seeing. Eventually government officials realized that the area could not support further growth and attract more tourists without road improvements. In order to support the need for road improvements, vehicle traffic counters were set out on roads. While there are a number of measurement tools available the one that I was most aware of was rubber hoses that were placed across the road called pneumatic road tubes. I am certain that there were other factors taken into consideration before the decisions for road widening projects were started. Factors such as traffic accidents, traffic congestion reports, hotel occupancy levels, and the growth of businesses along major road arteries I am sure all were taken into account. I can look at the impact of ongoing road projects and see what the impacts have been. More shopping outlets have built up along these roads. Major housing complexes have popped up and continue to pop up. A local university has grown by leaps and bounds from roughly 3,000 students in the late 1980’s to more than 10,000 students today. Retail stores would do well to learn the importance of customer counting systems as they serve a very similar purpose to the vehicle traffic counters.

Customer counting systems use a door counting sensor to keep track of the number of patrons entering a store. It also measure the time of day of the customers are entering the store. For store owners and managers this data can be used to maximize the use of payroll for staffing purposes. Stores without the protections offered by electronic article surveillance (EAS) can use a door counting sensor as a stand-alone device to track foot traffic patterns. Those stores with Checkpoint EAS towers can have the counter attached to it and get the added benefit of information to track alarm activations, times of activations and employee response to alarms. A sensor is a powerful tool to further improve shortage results and aid in identifying training opportunities for employees.

I want to be clear I am not suggesting the vehicle traffic counting systems were driving increases in visitors and growth in the area. There was an identified problem with traffic based on resident complaints, business owner input, accident reporting and I am sure local official input. It is also possible news outlets gave a picture of problem roads and conditions. The use of the vehicle traffic counters gave department of transportation officials the necessary information to support the argument for necessary improvements. THAT planned development in the proper areas led to ADDITIONAL growth and expansion. In like manner I am not suggesting a door counting sensor will bring in more customers that would be a logical fallacy. What I am saying is that the information you receive from your door counting sensor can be used to analyze your business. Compare your foot traffic to your sales and also your staffing. Are you seeing a drop in sales even when the patron count is higher, it could be you are not adequately staffing your store during those periods. You may need for sales floor assistance to help customer and cashiers to ring them up. As you identify your opportunities you strategically adapt your payroll budget. When sales begin to climb you may find you actually have room to expand your business, just as road improvements in my area has driven business and tourism growth.

Why not take a look at the possibility that customer counting systems could be helpful in improving store operations and driving sales? Consider installing a door counting sensor today.

Need information on a customer counting system? Give us a call at 1.866.914.2567 now.

I remember when I first moved to my state the road system was horrible in some areas. There was a military base to support and the area was a tourist destination as well. Two major road arteries coming into and out of the area were inadequate for the amount of traffic we were seeing. Eventually government officials realized that the area could not support further growth and attract more tourists without road improvements. In order to support the need for road improvements, vehicle traffic counters were set out on roads. While there are a number of measurement tools available the one that I was most aware of was rubber hoses that were placed across the road called pneumatic road tubes. I am certain that there were other factors taken into consideration before the decisions for road widening projects were started. Factors such as traffic accidents, traffic congestion reports, hotel occupancy levels, and the growth of businesses along major road arteries I am sure all were taken into account. I can look at the impact of ongoing road projects and see what the impacts have been. More shopping outlets have built up along these roads. Major housing complexes have popped up and continue to pop up. A local university has grown by leaps and bounds from roughly 3,000 students in the late 1980’s to more than 10,000 students today. Retail stores would do well to learn the importance of customer counting systems as they serve a very similar purpose to the vehicle traffic counters.

Customer counting systems use a door counting sensor to keep track of the number of patrons entering a store. It also measure the time of day of the customers are entering the store. For store owners and managers this data can be used to maximize the use of payroll for staffing purposes. Stores without the protections offered by electronic article surveillance (EAS) can use a door counting sensor as a stand-alone device to track foot traffic patterns. Those stores with Checkpoint EAS towers can have the counter attached to it and get the added benefit of information to track alarm activations, times of activations and employee response to alarms. A sensor is a powerful tool to further improve shortage results and aid in identifying training opportunities for employees.

I want to be clear I am not suggesting the vehicle traffic counting systems were driving increases in visitors and growth in the area. There was an identified problem with traffic based on resident complaints, business owner input, accident reporting and I am sure local official input. It is also possible news outlets gave a picture of problem roads and conditions. The use of the vehicle traffic counters gave department of transportation officials the necessary information to support the argument for necessary improvements. THAT planned development in the proper areas led to ADDITIONAL growth and expansion. In like manner I am not suggesting a door counting sensor will bring in more customers that would be a logical fallacy. What I am saying is that the information you receive from your door counting sensor can be used to analyze your business. Compare your foot traffic to your sales and also your staffing. Are you seeing a drop in sales even when the patron count is higher, it could be you are not adequately staffing your store during those periods. You may need for sales floor assistance to help customer and cashiers to ring them up. As you identify your opportunities you strategically adapt your payroll budget. When sales begin to climb you may find you actually have room to expand your business, just as road improvements in my area has driven business and tourism growth.

Why not take a look at the possibility that customer counting systems could be helpful in improving store operations and driving sales? Consider installing a door counting sensor today.